$7.5 Million Awarded in Los Angeles Birth Injury Suit

Los Angeles County reached a $7.5 million settlement on Thursday with a formerly homeless woman who filed a lawsuit after her son sustained brain damage during his birth at a county hospital.

The suit was filed by 25-year-old Dyrene Loftis, who claims that the staff at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center acted negligently in failing to treat her in 2012, causing her uterus to rupture and her unborn son to suffer brain damage.

Emergency crews rushed Loftis, who was then 39 weeks pregnant and experiencing severe abdominal pains, to the hospital in April 2012. She was sent home without being evaluated by an obstetrician after spending 14 hours in the medical center's labor and delivery unit.

Twelve hours later, Loftis was again rushed to the hospital after suffering a ruptured uterus and delivered a baby boy, Micah, via Caesarean section in the hospital's emergency room.

Micah suffered irreparable brain damage due to lack of oxygen to his brain during delivery.